Les âmes noires

This is another gangster film where there isn't all the action of the traditional entry in the genre. If Goodfellas is Saving Private Ryan, then Black Souls is more in the vein of The Thin Red Line, not the same caliber as that film but you get my drift.

This is much more of a character study of the players involved. The eldest of a trio of brothers has spent decades tending to his farm and staying out of the family business, which is for the most part unnamed shady stuff. But when his son goes to visit his goon of a brother with intentions of joining the dark side, a sequence of events fall in place resulting in a finish that I don't think anyone can see coming.

Not a lot happens in the first 2/3s of Black Souls in an action sense, and if I was in the wrong mood I might not have liked this as much as I did. But I thought the conflict between the four chief characters (the dad, his two gangster brothers, and his son) was established very convincingly. Come with patience to this one and you will be well rewarded. One of the scenes near the finish is simply magnificent.

But not the mafia movie I expected.

Seems to take the concept of the Sopranos one step further (or rather a step down)

It's a very nonviolent (for a gangster movie), and far more blue collar than Goodfellas is

Makes the whole organization feel more grounded.

I wonder if that's just the difference between the Italians and the Italian-Americans.

Well-acted. I really like the performance from the guy playing Luciano, the dad trying to keep his son away from the path his brother is on. A hard sell cause Luciano's brother's got all the cool stuff and treats his nephew like a man.

Must admit the story seems hard to follow. It's in Italian and the subtitles did not help. Plus the movie moves slower than expected.

Overall, it's one of those films that pays off with a small emotional climb up as you get to know that characters and how they live capped off with a roller coaster ride that's very fulfilling.

Recommend

"Dark Souls" or "Anime Nere", as the original title is, is a movie about a feud between two mob families, triggered from an act of recklessness perpetrated by a young man who desires to step into the "glorious", but sleazy and risky world of mafia, and defies his rural origins and the agricultural works his father is doing for a living. It benefits from silence (and total absence of soundtrack and sounds, in general) in certain scenes, a fact that amplifies the intensity which pervades them, or simply steers clear of sounds when silence is required. Marco Leonardi, Peppino Mazzotta and Fabrizio Ferracane deliver solid performances as the three brothers, the two first deeply involved in mafia's trade (mostly drug dealing), and the latter one as the seemingly innocent and uninformed (although he is the eldest brother), whose performance is extremely layered and he, as an actor, is exceptionally expressive and encapsulates every single emotion. Giuseppe Fumo stands out as the bold, careless, vengeful Leo who wants desperately to get engaged into the Mob's ruses, and acts without processing his ideas or following the instructions from his experienced uncles. The scenery is beautiful, the dialogue is equally witty and true to life, the storyline, although it steps in familiar ground, manages to keep the audience's interest during the whole runtime of this motion picture. Soundtrack perfectly matches every shot of this film, and it successfully integrates some Mediterranean customs concerning deceased family members, and grief is portrayed (and expressed) frankly and realistically. There are twists and turns near the end, that make it grim, but also credible. A flaw of this picture, though, is the abruptness of the ending, and the fact that makes no sense, but the final scene's ambiguity gives food for thought to the viewer. Apart from its defects, this is a well-made crime drama that, even though it's not a masterpiece, it honours its Mafia genre and it's recommended to the fans of it, and to the ones who would like to watch a dark European mob film, and have a good time too.

Last Saturday I went to see "Anime nere" at the London Film Festival with great expectation. In fact in August I had read a very positive review on La Repubblica newspaper. I must say it met completely my expectations, the movie is very well done, convincing and the light, the light is absolutely sublime. I like all the actors performances. The director told us, after the projection, that they were a mix of professional and not professional ones (very difficult to distinguish for the high quality of their performances). The plot is very intense, but not in a bad way. The most disturbing scenes are not shown on screen, but left to the audience imagination. The movie is set in a rural village in Calabria, south of Italy, where the three brothers were born and where Luciano, the elder, is still living with his family. The two younger brothers, instead, had moved to Milan in the north of Italy few years back.

Highly recommended, a potential candidate to next year foreign Grammy awards!!

Greetings again from the darkness. Avoiding the flashiness of GOODFELLAS or the complexity of another Italian crime family drama, 2008's GOMORRAH, this reserved-on-the-surface film from director/co-writer Francesco Munzi takes us to a small rural village located outside of Milan. In fact, this slow-burner has much in common stylistically with the 2010 Aussie gem ANIMAL KINGDOM.

Luigi (Marco Leonardi), Rocco (Peppino Mazzotta), and Luciano (Fabrizio Ferracane) are three brothers who have settled into life after the murder of their father by a rival crime family. Luigi is the hands-on leader of the family's drug business, and even though he thrives on the power and intimidation, he maintains a relatively low profile. Rocco is the behind-the-scenes businessman of the family enterprise. He and his fashion-forward wife live in a swanky Milan apartment and mostly avoid the front lines. Oldest brother Luciano has forsaken the family biz, and instead spends his days farming and working his goats.

Luciano's commitment to hard work and a straight life have not rubbed off on his son Leo (Giuseppe Fumo) who is drawn to the danger, money and power of his uncles' business. It's young Leo's fool-hearted actions that kickoff a chain of events putting the family smack in the midst of a possible war of mafia families.

This is no guns-blazing thrill ride of violence. Instead it's the type of movie that features countless scenes of men huddled in small groups mumbling details of the next important deal. Also, crucial are the non-verbal nods and raised eye-brows – signs that are interpreted as calls to action. We also learn that expressing hope someone lives to 100, is not just a personal insult, but such crass behavior that it brings a group dinner to an awkward halt.

Leather jacket abound, and the threat of violence looms over most scenes. However, it's the subtlety of the conversations and the quiet nature of the leaders that cause the well-meaning, but immature thirst for revenge from Leo to stand out. Until the twist of the final act, the only two moments of violence are almost surgical in their precision, leaving us with the impression that one's negotiating skills and loyal friends are every bit as crucial to success as one's expertise with a gun.

Mr. Munzi's film is very well directed and photographed, and features some terrific acting that generates the tension necessary to drive the story. It's a nice addition to the crime family genre, even if it's not at the level of the three mentioned in the opening paragraph above.